Ofcom Sitefinder website under threat?

DonnyDave

Ofcom sent out the following update e-mail on Tuesday 2 October:

Ofcom today announced a series of measures to ensure the future of the Sitefinder mobile base station locator website.

Sitefinder is an important public resource; Ofcom has always been and remains fully committed to supporting it on behalf of the Government and the general public. In light of a decision that Ofcom must publish the underlying Sitefinder data, which the mobile network operators (MNOs) considered to be commercially sensitive, they have ceased to provide any data on an ongoing basis to Ofcom. Following recent discussions, Ofcom has urged the MNOs to resume voluntarily providing Ofcom with updated information to ensure that the website can continue to be a useful source of information. We are optimistic that this will be achieved.

Background

Separately, Ofcom also confirmed today that it is appealing against the Information Tribunal’s decision on how the public interest, in balancing the public right to information and the protection of sensitive business information, should be assessed in this context. This is also an important point of general principle for future cases. Our discussions with the MNOs to voluntarily provide updated information for the website is unaffected by this process.

The 2000 Stewart Report recommended that a national database should be established giving details of all mobile base stations, making it easy for the public to identify all base stations in a defined area. As a result, the MNOs developed a voluntary agreement to provide certain data via the Sitefinder website.

On 4 September 2007, following a Freedom of Information request, the Information Tribunal upheld a decision by the Information Commissioner that Ofcom must publish, in addition to the information already made available by Ofcom on the Sitefinder website, further underlying data behind the database including the names of operators, specific locations and power levels of all mobile base stations. Because much of the underlying data is considered by the MNOs as commercially sensitive, and as a whole its disclosure could lead to malicious or criminal damage to the networks, the MNOs told Ofcom that they would be reluctant to continue providing it for the Sitefinder database if it was released publicly.

Ofcom was therefore concerned that Sitefinder would cease to be a valuable information tool for the public as the MNOs indicated that they would cease to provide data and subsequently took this action. (See website disclaimer at http://www.sitefinder.ofcom.org.uk/)

There doesn't appear to be any information on Ofcom's website, apart from on the Sitefinder home page.